#stuff bruce likes

Here we are saying, let's search for life in the universe; intelligent life like us. Well, who are we to say that we're intelligent? I pose that not as a joke question, but as a very serious question. We define ourselves to be intelligent in ways that no other creature can rival. Okay. Mow what do we credit that intelligence to? So, you look at the genome and let's take the chimp because that's a really close relative of ours. And we have high 90s percent indistinguishable DNA. And, the chimp does not build the Hubble telescope and the chimp does not compose symphonies. So, we must then declare that everything we say about us that is intelligent is found in that one and a half percent difference in DNA... If the genetic difference between humans and chimps is that small, maybe the difference in our intelligence is also that small.

Isn't that the premise (of the mutation that created the) X-men? They're human, but they have a genetically different... Different genes in them that are turned on and off within them, giving them special powers. So, are you suggesting the day might arise when we go inside the human genome and switch the dip-switches and come out superhuman?

Poor Richard Dawkins is so mindblown.

"Energy goes up as you approach gamma rays. With dramatic consequences if you have gamma ray exposure, by the way. Of course, you all know, you turn big green and ugly as the Hulk had experienced." -Neil Degrasse Tyson

3: 40 in. Best line so far: "Can I take us back to the organs and perhaps land in the universe?"

Oh, cool! Richard Dawkins and Neil DeGrasse Tyson!